Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Politics : Just the Facts, Ma'am: A Compendium of Liberal Fiction -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Sully- who wrote (77364)	2/9/2010 1:54:30 AM
From: Sully-	Respond to of 90947

White House wants to make filibuster a campaign issue? By: Mark Hemingway Commentary Staff Writer beltway-confidential 02/08/10 2:24 PM EST Or so Chris Cillizza at The Washington Post is reporting: <<< Over the past week, President Obama and his senior aides have repeatedly cited Republicans' filibuster threats as the primary reason for the lack of progress on big ticket legislative items, an early sign that Democrats will seek to use this bit of legislative arcana against the GOP in the coming midterm election. At a meeting -- televised, natch -- with Senate Democrats last week, Obama harped on the GOP's willingness to invoke the filibuster, noting that Democrats had taken more cloture votes to end debate and force votes in 2009 than they did in the 1950s and 1960s combined. Added Obama: "We've had scores of pieces of legislation in which there was a filibuster, cloture had to be invoked, and then ended up passing 90 to 10, or 80 to 15. And what that indicates is a degree to which we're just trying to gum up the works instead of getting business done." Later in the week, White House communications director Dan Pfeiffer penned a blog post on the evils of the filibuster, reciting -- almost word for word at times -- the argument Obama had made to his former colleagues. "Historically, the filibuster has been used as a way to try and reach a bipartisan compromise, now it's just a tactic used to gum up the works," wrote Pfeiffer. "This has prevented an honest debate from taking place, which has made it impossible to find agreement on important legislation that would benefit working families in this country." >>> Cillizza offers this bit of analysis: <<< The White House believes that the filibuster can be used as symbolic image for why the government (still) isn't working and why it's Republicans fault. "In the Senate, the filibuster only works if there is a genuine spirit of compromise and trying to solve problems, as opposed to just shutting the place down," Obama told Senate Democrats last week. "If it's just shutting the place down, then it's not going to work." The White House recognizes the deep distrust of Washington coursing through the electorate, reflected most prominently in the defeat of the establishment Democratic candidate in last month's Massachusetts special election. Given that Democrats control all levers of power in Washington, the White House needs to win the battle over who is working to maintain the status quo on Capitol Hill since the default position will be that it is their fault that more change hasn't come. >>> If this is what the White House is really thinking, they're incredibly obtuse. Voters in Democratic Massachussetts just elected Scott Brown on the explicit message he would be the 41st vote in the Senate to filibuster health care reform, but the White House thinks people are unhappy for not getting more done? Isn't the problem as much what the White House is trying to accomplish as it is that they haven't accomplished much? washingtonexaminer.com